


I Win, I'm Something

by Swindlefingers



Series: Ellara and Samson [5]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Plans, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-02
Updated: 2015-04-02
Packaged: 2018-03-20 21:15:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3665280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Swindlefingers/pseuds/Swindlefingers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oh hey, Samson and Ellara fight because sneaking around gets tiresome. Samson reveals his grand plan to get him out of the shadows. Did you know he makes plans? He does! Lots of talking, no humping, sorry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Win, I'm Something

Samson quietly opens the door to her quarters. He slips off his boots, places them next to the Inquisitor’s. Snorts at the absurdity of their boots lined up. Firelight from up above paints the ceiling with oranges and yellows. He recounts their fight yesterday as he scales the steps.

Tensions were high, she’d be leaving in a few days for too long. He’s upset, wants her be more upset than she shows, so he says unkind things. She’s frustrated, wants him to understand her position, tells him something like she can’t keep pouring herself into this if they’re both going to come out worse. Gives him options for leaving if he needs to. Tells him to think about things and come to her when he’s ready. She walks away. He throws a chair.

He’s come to her like she asked, standing at the top of her stairs. Skyhold is asleep, she’s not. She’s sitting cross-legged in the middle of her room, back to him. The months they’ve been at this, he knows her shape by now. The same shape he saw slip out of his room and calmly close the door behind her.

He watches her pull paper from a pile on her left, disappear in front of her for a scribble, and place them in another pile on her right. She looks small as the firelight scatters shadows around.

He could slink in to sit behind her, pin a kiss to the back of her neck, and wrap his arms around her middle. He could apologize without having to say it. She’d rap him on the head with her papers and she could accept his apology without having to say it. Nothing would change, though. Same troubles would hound them.

He squats down next to her instead, and places the creased flyer for the Grand Tourney on her pile of unread papers. Creased from being opened, pondered, and being folded up. He knows this is better than an apology; this is a plan. Games, jousting, and the winner of the grand melee wins the title of “Champion of the Inquisition”.

She takes the flyer up in her hand, fingertips beat across her forehead as she studies it. He takes a few steps back to sit at the edge of her bed.  
"It’s what I know," he starts as her fingers continue to drum. "I win, I’m something. I lose, and I’m no worse off than I am now."

"Are you sure about this?" she looks up at him from the flyer. "Josie set this up as a way to get gold and favor from nobles. It wasn’t meant to have any real influence. It’s just some fancy armor we parade around Orlais. What would you do with it?"

"What would you have me do?"

"Don’t ask me; tell me. What would you do with it?" She’s got bite in her words. He can see the strain on her face, the clench in her jaw.

All the things he imagined while looking at that flyer night after night start to tumble out, “I could train more groups like your Sutherland crew. Cullen wants nothing to do with them, I could do it. I could work with the Spymaster on setting up your personal guard. The bigger you get, the more enemies you’ll have. The Divine had the Seeker as her right hand, maybe the Champion is the Inquisitor’s right hand. I could be your right hand.”

There’s a knit in her brows. Her eyes dart around his face. Not sure what she’s looking for. Makes him doubt all the time he spent “thinking it through” like he was sure she’d pester him about. He hunches over, forearms on his knees.

"What’s to stop them from just… not giving you the title, or not letting you compete at all?" she refocuses on the flyer, fingers tracing the words, searching.  
  
"There’s nothing in there about who can and can’t compete. I’ve only got a little coin left to earn for the entrance fee. If I win that," he points to the flyer. "I can’t be denied the title without damaging the reputation of your Inquisition and none of your advisers will stand for it." He sits up with a grin, "I make the Inquisition look so righteous that even their enemies can’t help but join the cause. Josephine will be thanking me."

He quickly continues as a “why?” starts to form on her lips, “I use what I know to see what you can’t. I’ve got experience. I know what tyrants look like. I know what fear and desperation look like, I know how they can color the choices you make. I grab what the Chantry did to me by the grip, and I use it to ward off those things for your Inquisition,” he sighs and his knuckles through his scruff. “You treat your people fair. They’ve got hope in their eyes when they see your banner, when they see you. I want a part of that. I’ve always wanted to be a part of something like that.” His voice slips far away, “I even was for a time.”

It’s not pity he sees on her face, it’s worry.  
  
"That’s all well and good, Sam, but I can’t guarantee how long this will last. Who’s to say how long they’ll let me be the Inquisitor? I can’t tell you how this will end, or even if it’ll end well."

"That’s a fair bit of pragmatism coming from you. You sure it won’t all be children’s laughter, rainbows, and full bellies?"

"I’m sure that’s a bit of your influence."

"Let me make my choice. I do this, I become ‘Champion’, I can stop living like a fucking rat with the time I have left. I don’t have to do this, I want to do this."

"If this is what you really want to do, then I won’t question it again."

"This is what I really want to do."

The worry in her brow starts to unravel with a sigh. She’s even got a little smile curling on one side of her mouth. She shuffles over to him on her knees, handing back his opened flyer, sitting at his feet, “it’s a good plan. You’ve obviously spent time thinking it through.”

A few months ago he would have heard condescension in her words, he’s learned to accept her kindness at face value.

"I do this and we won’t have to hide," his voice rolls out soft.

"Is that part of why you’re doing this?" She pushes his knees apart. He doesn’t fight it. She shuffles in closer, her elbows resting on the top of his thighs. He pinches at her chin, "You were right. I can’t keep at this, neither can you. You deserve better."

She reaches up to wrap her hands around the sides of his neck, brushing her thumbs along the corners of his jaw. She pulls him down to touch her forehead against his. “So do you,” she reminds him. “I’m tired of hiding you.”

He holds onto her wrists, feels her pulse under his fingertips. 

It’d be easier to just push away, push all of it away. Take yesterday’s offer of a horse, and gold, and blue lyrium and just fucking leave. Maybe roam the countryside taking care of the few packs of red Templars still standing, giving them a clean death and a hollow, useless apology before fucking off to the Deep Roads. Maybe join the Wardens, pack up with Blackwall at the end of the month, consider himself absolved if he survives the Joining. They’ve taken in worse than him.  
  
He can’t, though. He watched her walk out of his little wooden room yesterday, closing the door behind her, and the painful twist in his chest told him he couldn’t go. 

He leans in to find her mouth. Her lips don’t taste of lust or want. They’re sweet and warm, taste of heart and hope. Fucking hope. He’d forgotten how light it felt, how it fills in all the cracks. This is could be good, this could be right. This is what he wants. 

Maker’s breath, he’ll let himself have this.


End file.
